The Power of Goodbye
by SonicTeamFreeWill
Summary: how many times has the Doctor said goodbye? Or missed his chance to? this is a collection of 'goodbye' oneshots throughout the Doctor's lives. Sorry I can only do New Who for now because that's all I've seen but maybe I'll add some old when I can
1. Learn to Say Goodbye

**AN ~ Inspired by 'Power of Goodbye' by Madonna. Listen and weep.**

**I've decided to dedicate this collection/story to the Doctor's goodbyes in general. That means Rose will get at least one, probably two; Martha will get one; Donna will get one; River will get at least one, probably two and when their time comes, Amy and Rory will get one and so on. Nine, Ten and Eleven themselves will probably get chapters too.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who. I own a dress that is, no kidding, TARDIS blue!**

**Anyway, this is...well, a painful moment. I'll let you read for yourself.**

.o.o.o.

_There's nothing left to try_

_There's no place left to hide_

_There's no greater power than the power of goodbye._

Learn to Say Goodbye

"See you soon, Sweetie." River kissed him one more time, briefly, and stepped out of the TARDIS. "Don't keep me waiting too long."

He made his farewells and watched her half-skip half-dance down the hallway to her cell, humming and still dancing as she locked herself back in, smiling at him out of the corner of her eye until he finally shut the door and turned his back on her.

Immediately, he took his hat off and all but tore the bow tie from around his neck. He tossed it onto the ground before him in a fit of...what was it? Rage? Distress? Frustration? Hopelessness?

"_Funny thing is, this means you've always known how I was going to die."_

His head fell back against the wood of the door. His legs threatened to give way underneath him. The Towers' songs echoed in his ears, and tears once again began to stream down his cheeks. He had to do this. He had to leave. He had to get up, and go to the console, and send himself far from Stormcage...

But he wanted to go back outside.

"Please," he sobbed. "Please take me away."

The TARDIS did not respond.

"I can't go back!" He flung himself away from the door and kicked at the foot of the stairs, his internal conflict exploding as he roared at his faithful machine. "You can't let me back out there! But I'll go...I'll go..."

His strength waned again and he collapsed against the door, facing it this time. His fingers rested on the lock. He _so badly_ wanted to turn it.

"River, I'm sorry." He whispered it to the door as tears of ice fell onto his hand. "I wish I could kiss you again, touch you again, tell you again...I love you. It's taken me this long to say it. I love you. I love you, and I'm sorry. But I can't go back outside. Because you've already had your last, and you made me swear not to change it._ Not one line, don't you dare..."_

He closed his eyes, and his pain was drowned in memories. Plenty of memories, because this always happened. He tried to keep a distance from them, to be friends and nothing more, but he was terrible at it.

Rose had been by far the worst until now. How many times had he thought he'd lost her? How many times had he feared for her, fought for her, killed for her...even died for her? But when her time had finally come, he kept going back for her. First Cardiff, then Bad Wolf Bay, then he hadn't even been mad when she'd come back from the parallel universe. He had let time and space fall apart for her. And it was wrong, so wrong. So selfish. He had held on so tightly that it nearly killed him.

And now he had done it again.

"Doctor?"

River's voice reached him from down the hall. He could hear her unlocking her door, running for him. She slammed into the door, struggling to open it, but the pinch of his fingers kept it closed.

Now he knew how Rory had felt, that day on Apalapucia when he, the Doctor, had shut the door on the older Amy_. This isn't fair. You're turning me into you. _Oh Rory. Oh Amy.

Suddenly the Doctor felt that much worse. Would he ever be able to tell them what had happened to their daughter? What was yet to happen? Did it matter?

Yes, of course it mattered. They were her parents. They had to know.

"Doctor, let me in!" River's voice was strangled with distress. "Please, please!" She battled with the door. She even tried sonicking it.

The Doctor took a deep breath.

"_You even gave me your screwdriver! That should have been a clue..."_

"River, I can't." It was not really meant for her to hear, but she did. River stopped all her shouting and struggling, and he felt her weight against the other side of the door. The Doctor pressed his hand to the glass. River matched his gesture.

"Doctor, please. Whatever this is, I can help you."

"No, River."

"Why are you crying?"

The Doctor stood up. He took a step back from the door.

"_And you cried. You wouldn't tell me why."_

Then she whispered his name.

In response, he whispered the last word she would ever speak.


	2. Ashes

**AN ~ Just when you think you're over PPD. After this oneshot, check out the song I quoted at the beginning. It ends too happily for this chapter but it is my official Loss-of-Ponds Song. (I have a Pond video to it here: watch?v=yc-rrAk8pxo&list=UU2dLGS_N1w0r1FqtMfVZRTw&index=9 (remove spaces after 'com')**

**Anyway, before you watch that, I bring sadness.**

_I don't know how much more love this heart can lose,_

_and I'm dying, dying from these exit wounds._

~ Exit Wounds, The Script

Ashes

His last life had been better at this.

Rose, Martha, Donna...even River – it felt strange that he had not known her back then, had not somehow sensed that she would be so very loved. She had known his name, yes, but his name was only the beginning. And yet, no matter how much he loved her – how much he loved any one of them – each of them and so many more had crumbled into ashes; burning away at the bottom of his heart, scarring him, staying with him, but for some cursed but unknown reason, never quite breaking him.

This time though: this time was like acid. There had been no smouldering agony. If they had died at the bottom of that building, or had never made it through the paradox alive, perhaps the Ponds could have glowed away in the embers for a few centuries with the others. But not like this: not when he had been given so much hope, and had it all snatched away at the fingers of a weak, lonely, cursed survivor.

"Doctor!" the catch, the waver in Amy's tone had been enough to crack that wall of aspiration, and when he had confirmed what had happened to Rory, he had felt the cracks spread. And then Amy had shaken her hair out of her face, and asked if there was room on the gravestone. And then River had kissed her mother's hand, with precious tears in her eyes. And then Amy Pond had turned around with matching tears, and shattered his safety net with three words.

"Raggedy Man...goodbye."

All the love, the regret, the guilt, the sheer terror of the chasm of loneliness that awaited him – all of it hit at once when Amelia disappeared. As always, she had been torn, but this time, not from within herself. She knew he needed her – she had to have known that – but she needed Rory. She always had. She loved him, and that was enough need.

So Amelia Pond had disappeared from 2012, and the piece of his heart that had always been hers – hardened and polished like stone by so many attempts at goodbye – burned like an exploding star in his rib cage, and he could not take it any more.

"_No."_

All the ashes of all his losses were rekindled into a roaring pyre that he wished would consume him, even though he knew that, as ever, it would not. He forced his hands against his eye sockets, hoping to hinder in some way the flames of anger and pain that engulfed his very structure, but they would not go. He straightened instead, and tried to stare at those words on that stone until they were just words.

But he could not do it. Because they were not just words. They were lives. Lives which were woven into the very fabric of his being. Lives which he had followed for two hundred odd years. Somehow, for some reason, he had come to expect that it would end differently for these two. Not that they would go on forever but that...well,yes actually. He had come to appreciate them as a constant in his life. As his family.

He tried to speak, and he could not. He felt a gentle hand take his, and he knew that River was standing behind him, but he could only stare at the stone and choke back sobs until the tears stopped coming.


End file.
